


Soulmate

by asarahworld



Series: The Doctor and Rose Tyler [11]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Mentioned Rose Tyler, Timepetalsprompts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-13
Updated: 2017-04-13
Packaged: 2018-10-18 12:06:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10616580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asarahworld/pseuds/asarahworld





	

“I know about her,” River says suddenly, quietly. The TARDIS is empty, her parents have long since gone to bed, and the Doctor is tinkering under the console. Sparks fly as he slides back into the open.

“Sorry?” He asks, and he sounds so confused and looks so ridiculous with the over-large goggles on.

“The TARDIS told me,” River continues. “About Rose Tyler.”

The Doctor lies on the floor, mouth gaping. He disappears back under the TARDIS controls.

“Doctor,” River’s voice is strained, he can hear her trying to hold back all emotion and of course she fails miserably. He ignores her, his ‘tinkering’ becoming more aggressive and frantic when he is abruptly pulled out by his ankles.

“Rude!” He says in a huff, scanning the console with his screwdriver.

“Put that screwdriver away, we all know that you are causing more damage than you’re fixing,” River says, irritated. The TARDIS lights the time rotor in agreement and the Doctor reluctantly replaces it in his breast pocket, still lying on the grating.

“I can take you back to prison like –” he snaps his fingers.

“But you won’t,” River can’t help but flirt back with him. He makes it too easy sometimes. It’s quiet then, quiet for a long time; though whether it’s an hour or two minutes is unknown and irrelevant.

“I know that you loved her,” River says eventually. The Doctor is silent. Her voice is surprisingly steady, when it feels like her world is crashing around her. River looks at him imploringly, as if waiting for him to deny it. He doesn’t.

“You loved her?” Her voice is quieter, more vulnerable than he’s ever heard her.

He wets his lips, trying to force himself to answer her, trying to ignore her use of the past tense. Pathetically, even now, decades after he’s last seen her, he can’t say the words aloud. Every moment in which he ever tried come back, and he swallows, bringing a hand to his forehead. How can such a small word sum up his feelings for her? She was his rock, his equal, his partner, his wife on almost every planet they’d visited together, his soulmate.

“Doctor,” she says, and he looks up again, and meets her eyes. Somehow, without saying a word, he must have communicated something to her because her expression has changed – her eyes have hardened, her face carefully devoid of emotion.

“What do you want me to say?” The Doctor’s face is a mask of calm, his voice neutral, how can he be so blasé when River’s world is spinning off-course? “I’m a thousand years old, unless I’m lying again, which I might. You think it so impossible that I’ve been in love?” The words stick in his throat and he has to force them out.

“Are you certain that you’re using the right tenses, sweetie?” River’s hearts tightened unbearably. The Doctor did not answer and River knows now why she is fighting for his hearts.


End file.
